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The position of the Court of Cassation on the difficult matter of the applicability of the exception for private copying set out in paragraph 2 of Article L. 122-5 of the French Intellectual Property Code to the downloading of protected works was much awaited. Yet although it seemed to be an ideal opportunity, the Court reversed a court of appeal’s decision which had discharged an Internet user who had downloaded cinematographic works … merely on questions of procedure, leaving the matter still not settled. There was the high-profile decision of the court of appeal of Montpellier (see IRIS 2005-4:...

The Société des auteurs et des compositeurs dramatiques (French society of dramatic authors and composers - SACD), the Syndicat des producteurs indépendants (French syndicate of independent producers - SPI) and the Chambre syndicale des producteurs de films (French syndicate of film producers - CSPF), considering the channel Fox Life, launched in France in 2005 and directed mainly at the French market, had artificially relocated its registered office to Italy in order to escape the constraints of French legislation, referred the matter to the Conseil Supérieur de l’Audiovisuel (audiovisual regulatory...

On 4 May the French President set up the Digital Strategy Committee, which is responsible for assisting the changeover of the whole country from analog television to digital television by 2011. At the same time, Mr Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, Minister for Culture and Communication, launched a procedure for consulting with professionals in the sector on proposals for amending the Act of 30 September 1986, with a view to the launch of terrestrially-broadcast high-definition digital television and mobile television. Two alternative procedures were suggested for mobile television - one procedure consisting...

In a judgment delivered on 27 April, the regional court in Paris declared null the brand names registered by the channel Pink TV and banned it from using its title. The channel, which has been broadcasting by cable and satellite since October 2004, was summoned to appear in court by an audiovisual production company that had registered the brand name “P.I.N.K.” (“Programmes d’Information Non Konformiste”) in December 1999 in order to designate the production and broadcasting of television programmes. The company had used the brand name in producing a programme entitled “P.I.N.K”, with seven broadcasts...

The idea behind the film “ Paris je t’aime ” was for twenty film producers (including Joel and Ethan Coen, Olivier Assayas, Wes Craven, Fred Auburtin and Gérard Depardieu, and Gus Van Sant) to write and produce a five-minute film illustrating the theme of a lovers’ meeting in one specific area of Paris, which were then to be put together to make a full-length film; the film was selected for the opening of the “ Un certain regard ” section of the Cannes Film Festival on 18 May. Two days before the screening, however, the presiding judge of the regional court in Paris, deliberating in an urgent matter,...